The month of August is about to be closed shut, vacated and left for pasture while September slowly creeps in. That is good news for guys like me who work outside in the scorching heat in the burning Las Vegas sun.

But for the mixed martial arts world, that simply means arguably the most important 31 days in the history of our beloved sport has past us by, forever etched in our brains.

Hopefully MMA will see many more months just like August 2005, a pivotal time for the sport that saw the likes of a major K-1 event, two UFC events, the debut of season two of “The Ultimate Fighter” and lastly PRIDE “Final Conflict,” which featured the Grand Prix finals and Fedor Emelianenko (Pictures) defending his heavyweight championship against Mirko Filipovic (Pictures).

Certainly as time passes us by, we media will liken another stretch of time as “the most important” or “the most critical.” But as August 2005 closes it’s obvious that this truly was the “most crucial” month for the sport thus far.

I won’t bog my readers down by rehashing my thoughts on the UFN, K-1, TUF II and UFC 54 because there is simply no point in doing so. I will, however, devote my time and energy into delivering my thoughts and opinions on the mega MMA opus that was PRIDE: Final Conflict 2005.

While the card itself wasn’t exactly the be-all, end-all of MMA events, PFC 2005 was thrilling enough for yours truly — an affair that will be engrained within my psyche as far as fight cards go.

Final Conflict 2005 wasn’t perfect (I’ll explain that aspect), but the flaws were miniscule compared to the excitement that was Fedor-Cro Cop, Arona-Silva and Rua-Arona.

Another positive aspect of the event was the fact that circus clowns like Bob Sapp (Pictures), Giant Silva and Akebono (I know, I know: he’s a K-1 guy) were nowhere to be found. Also a bright spot about Final Conflict 2005 was the fact that ol’ (un)reliable Mauro Ranallo wasn’t anywhere near as annoying as usual.

I actually grew somewhat accustomed to hearing the PRIDE play-by-play broadcaster try his best to perform that “radio voice” and struggle when figuring out what submission attempts the fighters were trying. But hey, props are given to Mauro at last (if saying that he was not as annoying as usual truly is props).

Fedor is not human — he is an android

It usually is a curse when a certain community within the fight world begins to clamor about a fighter then steps back in awe and labels him unbeatable. Once a fighter has been adorned with such a moniker, it usually brings catastrophic results, prompting the fighter under scrutiny to fudge up and lose … sometimes twice in a row.

It happened to Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (Pictures). It happened to Matt Hughes (Pictures). It happened to Randy Couture (Pictures). It happened to Wanderlei Silva (Pictures).

It won’t, however, happen to Fedor Emelianenko (Pictures).

Sure, Fedor was rocked when his Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic blasted him with two successive straight left hands, but the Russian machine recovered quickly and wound up trouncing Cro Cop. Though the fight carried through the allotted timeslot, it wasn’t close.

Fedor put a systematic beating on the Croatian, welding shut his stake at claiming the title of world’s baddest heavyweight. Sure, Cro Cop survived and actually fought very well from his back, but he simply couldn’t do a thing to offset the incoming attrition from Fedor. When the fight was eventually brought back to the feet, Fedor nullified Cro Cop’s attacks, limiting him to single strikes and eventually scored takedowns.

Cro Cop was supposed to pose as a legitimate threat to dethrone Fedor, but while he hung in there and kept the fight entertaining, the duel, in essence, was a shellacking in favor of the defending PRIDE heavyweight champion.

Fedor has yet to lose in PRIDE and after he dismantled and subsequently battered Filipovic who is left for him to tackle? Godzilla? Witnessing Fedor lay waste to the heavyweight division for the last few years is like watching SKYNET’s T800 Series Terminators destroy Los Angeles.

Seriously, let’s ponder who exactly stands a chance at toppling Fedor in the wake of his whipping of Filipovic. Nobody in the heavyweight class within PRIDE’s ranks will beat him. Not Nogueira (he’s already lost twice), not Cro Cop if/when they rematch, certainly not Mark Hunt (Pictures), not Josh Barnett (Pictures) and not Sergei Kharitonov (Pictures).

Fans and media alike always boast of PRIDE’s supreme heavyweight division, but if only one, maybe two fighters pose only a relative threat to the king’s throne, exactly how deep is the division?

That’s not to say the UFC’s are any better. Absolutely nobody — and I mean nobody — currently under contract to Zuffa stands a snowball’s chance in Hell against Fedor. Andrei Arlovski (Pictures) would get his ass handed to him. Tim Sylvia (Pictures) would be submitted within a minute or two. Frank Mir (Pictures) would gas after three minutes and wind up getting pummeled into submission. And Paul Buentello (Pictures) would get clobbered.

As it is right now, Fedor is an unstoppable juggernaut bombarding his opposition like Genghis Kahn decimating ancient Asia and parts of Europe.